Vivaldi has 15 days to agree on the thorny issue of pensions. Prime Minister Alexander De Croo wanted to complete a series of files before the parliamentary holidays and he managed to skim some of them. The 2% of the GDP for the army, the jobs deal and the extension of nuclear power are acquired. The review of the 2023 budget and solutions for purchasing power have been postponed until September. The big tax reform will wait, because it does not appear in the government agreement.
The last major issue therefore remains the pension reform, an explosive reform for which several kerns will be necessary. The various councils of ministers of the past weekend and that of Monday evening were not enough to conclude an agreement.
To understand why the subject is so delicate, it is necessary to visualize its budgetary importance. Pensions represent the largest share of government expenditure. For 2022, the expenditure of the federal administration and social security represents 164.1 billion euros. Of this sum, 57 billion goes solely to pensions. Given that the Belgian population is aging and the number of people retiring is increasing, much of the debate revolves around the sustainability of the reform project. How to finance these pensions?
Taxing workers more is out of the question for the partners, especially in this period. Reducing payments to pensioners is also not an option. It remains to increase the number of people who contribute…
Until now, the government was working on four key measures: the pension bonus (i.e. a financial incentive to work longer), the part-time pension (i.e. a reduction in working time at the end of the career), the calculation of the days actually services and the taking into account of inequalities (women are harmed in the calculation).
A fifth point has been added since the Prime Minister took over the file: the early departure at age 60, after 42 years of career (against 44 currently). A measure labeled PS that De Croo would have accepted to pass the agreement, but on which the MR turned. To satisfy the latter, it was then proposed to speak of effective work for the minimum pension, a point which irritates the Socialists. “A self-employed person who has worked all his life must be able to earn more than an inactive person”, we summarize in the liberal camp. The Open VLD talks about basing the calculation on 20 years of actual work. Pensions Minister Karine Lalieux (PS) defends a calculation over 10 years. The will now would be to calculate the work done during the existence in days and no longer in years.
A kern pension is expected on Thursday. Upstream, the intercabinet discussions will be able to feed on a report from the social partners scheduled for July 6.